Monday, January 21, 2013

The Presidential Inaugural Committee has included a gay pastor and a number of LGBT supportive faith leaders in the inauguration festivities this week. According to LGBT media watchdog GLAAD, openly gay pastor theRev. Nancy Wilson of the Metropolitan Community Churches (MCC), a denomination with a specific outreach to LGBT communities, will participate in the interfaith prayer service at the National Cathedral on Tuesday. "It is profoundly meaningful to read the Bible during President Obama and Vice President Joe Biden's second inaugural interfaith service," said Wilson. "As I read, I will remember the hands laid on me seven years ago in this very cathedral by faith leaders who called me to serve all of God's beautifully diverse children, including LGBT people. President Obama prayerfully and respectfully stood up for LGBT equality during his campaign, and I am proud to stand with him."Wilson is not the only LGBT-friendly faith leader who is scheduled to participate in inauguration activities this wek. Most visibly, Episcopal priest and LGBT supporter theRev. Luis Leon was chosen to deliver the benediction at President Obama's inauguration ceremony on Monday. Leon -- a priest at St. John's Church, which is located near the White House -- was the replacement for the Rev. Louie Giglio, the Georgia pastor who stepped down from the role after coming under fire for an anti-gay sermon he gave in the 1990s.

Wednesday, January 9, 2013

(CNN)— When laws went into effect in three states for same-sex couples to marry, many were quick to line up at their city halls to exchange vows. Now they may do so in one of the nation's most prominent churches - the Washington National Cathedral.

Most Americans know the house of God, also called the Cathedral Church of St. Peter and St. Paul, as a place where sacred rites are carried out on behalf of the nation. It has been host to the funerals of numerous presidents and of inaugural prayer services for four presidents, including Barack Obama.

Monday, January 7, 2013

Fox News Anchor Megyn Kelly: Well there's a new film coming out that takes a look at a group called the Muslim Brotherhood and its influence around the world and here at home. The documentary is called The Grand Deception and it describes what the film makers call the dual nature of the Muslim Brotherhood. To the outside world it tries to present a moderate image, claim the film makers, all the while hiding more radical goals including goals for America...

Tuesday, January 1, 2013

(Reuters) - The United Arab Emirates has arrested an "Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood cell" that trained local Islamists in how to overthrow Arab governments, a Sharjah-based newspaper reported on Tuesday, citing an unnamed source familiar with the investigation.

The oil-rich Gulf state - of which Sharjah is one part - has previously voiced strong distrust of the Islamist political movement which after long years of being banned took power in free elections in Egypt last year.

The cell, of "more than 10 people", had a defined organizational structure and was recruiting Egyptians in the UAE to join, al-Khaleej newspaper reported.

It said the cell had formed companies to send money illegally to Egypt.

A senior Muslim Brotherhood official has said that Israel will cease to exist within a decade, the latest in a series of inflammatory comments by figures close to Egypt's Mohammed Morsi.

Essam el-Erian, deputy head of the Brotherhood's political arm, the Freedom and Justice Party, was trying to lay to rest a controversy over comments he made in an interview last week, in which he invited Egyptian-born Jews to return to the country.
In an interview with the Saudi-backed newspaper Al-Sharq al-Awsat, Mr Erian said that the "ideology of Zionism" had ended in failure and that "Palestine's occupiers" should leave to make way for the return of Palestinians.